This was a controversial walk. Controversial because I tackled some Munros without Sandie. It is also not the route that Tom and I intended and not one that I would recommend. We did see some great scenery and climb some of the finest mountains around but we knew it about afterwards! The intention was to take two days covering various summits either side of the Lairig Ghru, a route which was flexible dependent on how we got on. What we didn't envisage was that day one would be so tough that we didn't really fancy day two! We had planned to camp out the night before somewhere in/near Rothiemurcus but, having found nowhere suitable, we ended up spending the night in the car. Unfortunately, we didn't get much sleep and headed to the Cairngorm Ski Centre car park at 5am. We headed up the steep path to the Ptarmigan restaurant (closed sadly!) and our first bit of weather arrived. A Combination of wind, sleet and snow made it hard going up the well built footpath to the summit of Cairn Gorm. From here, we had fantastic views across the plateau the largest lump of mountains in the land, much of which was still under snow. We descended the summit towards the Northern Corries and followed the cliff edge to the craggy summit of Cairn Lochan, with great views into the corrie itself. The blanket of snow and poor visibility made navigation tricky and we took a slightly tortured route towards Ben Macdui, wary of the icy cold burns beneath the snow that we really didn't want to take a dip in. Finally, we made the steep, rocky ascent to the second highest summit in the UK. Ben Macdui is said to haunted by the Grey Man but he certainly wasn't around that day. Maybe even he draws the line at some weather. Even still, there was a slightly surreal feeling at the summit, no doubt enhanced by the memorial and debris of an RAF Avro Anson, which crashed into the mountain on a training flight in 1942.

As we left the summit of Ben Macdui, the on/off snow had turned to rain. We made the steep, and not particularly comfortable descent towards the northern end of the Carn a'Mhaim ridge. From here, it didn't look too inviting to me, as someone who isn't too keen on exposure, and my anxiety wasn't helped knowing that taking this ridge to the summit was pretty much the only way down to the Lairig Ghru path from here. Fortunately, my apprehension was misplaced and this was, in fact, a fantastic ridge and probably the most enjoyable of the three summits. By the time we reached the cairn, the rain had got quite heavy and persistent and we'd also both concluded that our bodies couldn't cope with any summits the following day. We decided to get down to the Lairig Ghru, spend the night, then walk out in the morning. By the time we reached the footpath following another tough descent, we had also decided that we didn't fancy setting up camp in the heavy rain and carrying our wet gear in the morning. We headed for Corrour Bothy, hopeful that on a miserable Tuesday, it would be empty. By the time we got their we were quite exhausted and our outer clothing was starting to saturate such was the persistence of the heavy rain. It was something of a disappointment, then, to discover that there was already three guys in the bothy. We would have been quite within our rights to stay - we were clearly in need of shelter and these guys had simply made the short trip from Bob Scott's bothy, just ?? miles away. However, we didn't feel comfortable and so we made the decision to walk back to Tom's car along the Lairig Ghru. The Lairig Ghru is the ancient drover's path from Aviemore to Braemar, a popular route that cuts through the Cairngorm massif, and in places it is quite a rugged path. We plodded on, keen to get out of the mountains before dark. We eventually reached Rothiemurcus Forest at about 11 o'clock and we felt like we'd made it. Unfortunately, the forest turned out to be quite a tricky place to find our way around in the dark and it took another two hours to find the car, thanks to a combination of a soggy map and some very unhelpful signs. Once at the car, we changed and headed back to my car, though not before stopped by the National Park ranger's wondering what we were doing in a lay-by at 1 in the morning. Needless to say, we slept very well in the car that night.
While at times we didn't appreciate it, and Tom's knee did somewhat seize up overnight, on reflection this was a good day out on the hill, if a little long. I'll certainly be back to these mountains, Sandie has to catch up for a start, but I'll take a different route.